I've had an itch for an FAL for some time now and have been trying to figure out the best route to take. I'm leaning towards building one because it's cheaper. I can get Century R1A1 inch pattern stripped receivers for $150 and Century G1 metric stripped receivers for $190, and I have found some Imbel and Aussie parts kits online. Are these Century receivers junk or would be fine for a build? I know the Aussies used inch pattern rifles but couldn't find out what pattern Imbel used. The Imbel kits run around $550 and the Aussie is around $675. I like the looks of the Aussie kits, with the beat up wood furniture and new made barrel with chrome lined bore, the most. Both parts kits come with everything but the receiver, and possibly the locking shoulder. Assembling a parts kit seems pretty straightforward with the exception of the locking shoulder, which stumps me a bit. Would it be worth it to go the parts kit route? Or am I in over my head with this and should just pick up a DSA?

I don't know a lot, but I do know that guys say to run away from CAI FAL receivers.

Falfiles.com  it's your bible, all you need to know is there.

i put one together with a century inch and it needed a lot of work, can be done, but its not the first one to start on.

Century receivers have always been a crap shoot. When they work, they work as well as any other. When they have issues, you'll at least contemplate smashing the damn thing.

For a basic, no-frills FAL, get an IMBEL kit from Arizona Response Systems, and a Type III receiver from DSA (Coonan will not help you out at all if there is a problem with their receiver). Faltools.com has a receiver wrench, barrel vise, and alignment tools. Get .308 GO and NO-GO gauges from Brownells. Most people use pin gauges to determine the required locking shoulder thickness, but I prefer a set of Starrett Hole Gauges. Much more versatile than pin gauges.

Miscellaneous other tools:
3/4" drive bar for the receiver wrench
-1/2" and 9/16" for the receiver wrench bolts and barrel vise bolts respectively
-anti-seize grease for the barrel threads
-rosin for extra grip on the barrel vise
-bench vise to hold barrel and barrel vise assy.
-set of calipers
-buttstock tool: for safely installing or removing the recoil springs
-extractor tool: makes installing or removing the extractor a breeze
-a handful of punches and a hammer for driving in pins
-screwdrivers

So, for a few hundred bucks in tools (most of which can be used for other tasks; all of which can be used to service your FAL[s]) and some reading on the subject, you can wrench one together in your garage.

Gunthings.com has NOS Israeli mags, and there are always some floating around on the FAL Files Marketplace. DSA or the Marketplace is your go-to for small parts.

This is truth! I put a Century receiver into a chop saw and cut it into 4 pieces so that I would not ever be tempted to spend one more second of my life trying to make it work. 
 On the other end of the spectrum, Century receiver that have serial numbers that begin with CA a generally good to go. The CA is for Caspian Arms and they make good stuff.

There is a nice DSA Type I rifle for sale there right now for $1150 IIRC.   I would rather have it than the abortion you are describing, even for a little more money.

EDIT:   LOL, just saw that it is for sale here in the EE.

My thoughts... go with Metric vs. Inch. Mostly because the magazines are more readily available.

I'd spend the extra money for a DSA-brand receiver if I were you, even if you do use a parts kit for the rest. Avoid century.


As to the actual assembly questions, check in with @chase45. He recently assembled one.

Won't inch receivers feed from metric mags?

My experience is, technically yes, they can, but somewhat less reliably because they fit loosely.


There are far more metric receivers and magazines out there; you are not doing yourself a disservice sticking with metric.

Buy a parts gun on a metric IMBEL receiver.

Decide whether you like it.

Swap-out parts as your interest and budget suits you.

I am for sure going with an Imbel parts kit from ARS, and I'm still trying to figure out what route I want to take on the receiver. I am thinking I can make the receiver wrench and barrel vice, or at the very least rent one from someone willing to do so. I will stay away from the Century receivers, I don't want to deal with a crap shoot. Once I get all that sorted out I am thinking about doing a Rhodesian camo job to scare the commies off

ETA: Thanks to lew and the rest, your responses answered many questions.

The Century receiver gets you one US part...you still need 5 or 6 more depending on what you want to do on the muzzle.

922r is still on the books.

Agree with the above.

Assembly is pretty easy really. I may do it a little different than whats recommended. The "hard" part I suppose is timing the barrel(right or wrong, after my build I recommend just making sure the piston moves freely, if so then it should be timed pretty right) and also using the correct locking shoulder for proper headspacing. Use pin gauges to determine which size locking shoulder you need. The rest is really straight forward. Don't forget to put the handguard thing a doo on the barrel before installing the barrel to the receiver though

FALs are not a hard build IMHO.

plenty of guys here in this thread with a TON of knowledge to help you on your adventure.

My pleasure. Let me know when yer ready to paint and I might be nice enough to send a portion of the two quarts I have.